by Bob Finley
"We aren't going to do anything. You’re going to go hook up with the rest of our group and get ready to leave. Tell Kim I said to get the VIKING ready."
"Well, what are you going to do?"
"I’m going after our mole."
"Are you crazy? He's already tried to kill both of us. And Kim, too. Why would you want to give him another chance?"
"I don’t."
"So...?"
"But I have to."
"Why do you have to? It isn’t your job!"
Marc sighed. "Because they’ll kill him if they catch him. And, if he's telling the truth about Leo and the bombs, he’ll only be the first of thousands, maybe millions, to die. And, in the end, he’ll have won. Even dead, he’ll still get his revenge. I can’t let that happen. Not if I can help it."
They looked at each other in silence for several moments. Finally, she gave a slight shake of her head.
"Be careful."
"I’m always careful," he said, and smiled.
"Right," she chided. "Tell it to somebody who doesn't know you."
He held her gaze. "You don't know me," he said.
She returned the gaze just as steadily. "No," she agreed. "Not yet."
He grinned and lifted her chin with one finger. "Go find Kim," he said.
The ‘quake threw them together, hard. The floor seemed to undulate, then tilt. A sharp, staccato CRACK! rippled through the rock walls, sounding remarkably like polar ice he'd heard on a previous charter the year before. The lights dimmed and stayed dimmed for a full fifteen or twenty seconds. Two more shocks followed almost immediately, close together, but less strong than the first. The quiet that followed seemed somehow ominous.
They got up, still holding on to each other.
"I hate to add any more doom and gloom, but it looks like Frank might have known what he was talking about."
Her eyes went wide and her lips parted, but she bit off whatever she had been about to say.
He gripped her by the upper arms. "Look, I think you’d better go get Kim and the others together. Just be sure those TRAP guys have taken care of the guards. You don't want to get caught in a cross-fire. But don’t waste any time. We may not have it to waste." He turned and sat down in the hole, bracing one foot on the first rung of the ladder driven into the rock of the shaft. He looked up at her.
"Hurry," he urged.
"You, too. And please be careful!"
He nodded and dropped down the shaft without further delay. She turned and hurried away, being careful to avoid looking at the body as she gingerly stepped around it.
Marc clambered down the twenty-foot ladder as quietly as he could. He really didn't want to do this. He had the feeling that he was entering a rat trap and Jambou was the cheese. At the bottom of the ladder he paused. Standing very still, he listened. Hollowness. Nothing. He looked around in the gloom but there was nothing remarkable about the place.
"Well," he murmured to himself, "nothing to do, but do it." He slipped the clip from the 9mm Beretta. Plenty of ammo. He slapped it back into the butt and checked to see that the safety was off. Taking the weapon in a two-handed grip, he eased away from the ladder shaft and began descending the stone steps. He hugged the inner wall of the dungeon-like stairwell, very much aware that he had no cover at all if Jambou should suddenly appear. He'd just have to be ‘fustest with the mostest’, like a brute of a pro football lineman had once replied when asked the reason for his success.
The dungeon steps curved on. Finally, twenty or thirty feet down, he became aware of a glow that was noticeably brighter than the poorly illuminated stairwell. He stopped to listen, then moved carefully to his left to get a better idea of what was coming. Water. A pool. Underwater lighting that caused the pool to glow. He crossed back to the inside wall, held his weapon at the ready, and stealthily continued his descent.
As he reached the bottom step, the small cavern opened up. There was a pool of clear water, glowing bluish-green from the row of lights that ringed it six feet below the surface. The pool was a rough rectangle six yards wide by eight yards long. He couldn't really see a bottom, but the water on the far side was much darker, so he assumed it was deeper there. There were piles of diving gear hastily strung along the narrow quay that ran the length of the pool. Wet suits, fins, weight belts, masks...all jet black. Seven piles. Seven TRAP team members. "Six, now," he corrected himself, remembering the pitiful remains in the corridor upstairs. "So. This is how they got in. I wonder how they knew it was here?" Then he remembered that his own crew had detected something in this vicinity, as well, but discounted it because it was much smaller than the shaft through which they'd brought the VIKING in. "But, why the pool?" He thought about that. And its size. And then he thought to look over the edge and knew. There were several rough hemp devices attached to the sheer rock wall at the waterline. "Fenders," he made the connection. He got down onto his hands and knees and peered more closely over the edge. Sure enough. Something yellow on some of the rocks. Paint. He stood up. Someone had kept a yellow submersible tied up here. Someone? Jambou, of course. This was probably where he kept the subs that had attacked him when they first arrived. But...he'd killed two of them. There must have been a third. Of course. Two for defense. One for his personal use. In this case, his ‘back door’. It made sense. As many backup devices and escape routes he’d already seen in Jambou's planning, he would, of course, have some way of getting away if his world fell in on him.
Escaped. Justin's shoulders sagged. The black-hearted rat had deserted his sinking ship. And he, Justin, had let him get away. The water in the pool began to dance. Just as Marc looked at it and frowned, there was a deep booming sound that wasn't so much a sound as something he felt. Then there was a tremendously sharp CRACK! as if a rifle had fired just inches from his head. Marc dropped to a crouch, waiting for something to fall on him but, instead, the rock ledge on which he knelt began vibrating. When it worsened suddenly, he felt that if he tried to talk, it would be like someone beating on his back to make his voice do a drum tattoo. The vibration permeated his whole body and made his skin tingle. Water in the pool started sloshing from one side to the other until waves were splashing over the edges and running in pools around him, pouring in rivulets back into the pool. He looked at the diving gear and wondered whether he had time to get into any of it. And whether, if he dived into the pool, would he be able to find a way out or be trapped and drown. He tried to remember how deep the tunnel from this pool must be where it emptied into the open sea, but he couldn't concentrate or just couldn't remember from that time so long ago that they had reconnoitered this undersea prison before their capture.
The tremors subsided abruptly and the water stopped slopping over the edges and contented itself to just slosh back and forth in its own prison.
Marc tentatively stood up, looking around the small cavern, wondering if it was safe to move. The only sound now was that of the still-surging sea water in the pool. He reminded himself that this pool, and the tunnel that most likely led to the outside world, were here because at one time or another they had been filled with white-hot, molten lava seeking a path to the sea. And, from the seismic activity of the past few days, especially the last few hours, this pretty little hideaway might soon become hazardous to his health. With one backward glance at the diving gear, he headed for the dungeon steps that led back up to the penthouse. He had to let Strickland and his men know that Jambou had escaped. Not that he relished that task. And he had to get his people out of this time bomb. He was surer than ever that Frank Sheppard was right. This place was going to blow.
Trotting back up the steep steps to the ladder in the shaft above, he happened to reach out with his left hand to balance himself...and quickly jerked his hand back. The rock face was hot to the touch. Very hot. Somewhere not very far behind that wall there had to be lava. A lot of it. And it was looking for a way out. And they were in its way.
He began to run.
Chapter 95
Jerr
y Carruthers turned to acknowledge the presence of the CommSpec who waited just at the edge of what the enlisted man knew to be the Captain's comfort zone.
"Yes?"
"Sir, message from the Seawolf."
Carruthers ignored the paper in the messenger's hand. "What is it?" he asked.
"Sir, they report increased seismic activity in their area. Epicenter is the target, sir. They request permission for," he looked down and read from the flimsy in his hand, "a course change that will establish perimeter patrol at three thousand yards from target instead of their current two thousand yards, sir."
"Is that all?"
"No, sir. They also report the probability of an acoustic disturbance that resembles the signature of a miniature submersible."
The Captain turned toward the CommSpec. "The ‘probability’?"
"Yes, sir. Apparently it's buried in the mud of the seismic noise. But they're tracking it and they're pretty sure it’s a mini-sub, sir."
"Tell ’em I want to see it. And tell ‘em to stay where they are."
"Yes, sir." The Communications Specialist second class hurried back to his console.
In less than two minutes, a monitor in CIC dedicated to intra-fleet transmissions came to life with a CAD-generated, three-dimensional view of the mini-sub...if that's what it was. Carruthers strode over for a closer look.
"Profile it," he ordered.
Manipulating the inbound data stream with their own CAD system, a petty officer a few feet away converted the image to comply with the Captain's request. The image on the screen changed to show the undersea mountain to scale, as seen from the side.
"Rotate it."
A flurry of keyboarding and the entire mountain pivoted on the screen. Now the red circle that was the supposed mini-sub could be seen to move. Small yellow dots tracked its progress, a new dot appearing every time the target moved at least one hundred feet horizontally. In profile, the yellow dots described a line that ran almost level at a depth of a little more than three hundred feet for almost five hundred yards after it left the mountain. Then there was a marked change. The target stopped its forward motion and began to move deeper.
"One-fifty scale, please."
"Aye, sir, scaling to one hundred fifty percent," answered the sailor at the keyboard.
A couple of strokes, a flicker of the monitor, and the data became denser. Now, instead of a gradual descent, the display showed that not only was the target descending, it was also zigzagging as it did so.
"What am I seeing here?" Carruthers asked.
"Sir, I think if I increase magnification a bit more and factor in depth-of-field on the data, what we'll see is that the sub’s...that is, the target...is in a spiraling dive," the computer operator suggested.
Carruthers nodded. It made sense. "Try it," he said.
It took a half-minute, but when the image reformed on the screen, it was so sharply defined that there was no doubt that the man had been right on target. The forward movement was now read in tens-of-feet instead of fifty or a hundred and the yellow dots had become almost solid vertical ribbons that changed shading every time the sub moved away from or closer to the submarine that was transmitting the data.
"Excellent," the Captain said. "You couldn’t have been righter. Now...that raises some questions. Who’s in that thing? And where the blazes does he think he’s going, out here in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by half the navies in the world?" He watched the slowly moving image for ten or fifteen seconds.
"Sir, transmission from Seawolf," the CommSpec announced from his console. "They say there’s something odd about the sounds they’re getting from the submersible."
"Odd in what way, Mr. Gentry?"
"Sir, their sonar spec says there seems to be what sounds like a servo motor that's cycling over and over. Like there’s a pattern to it. And he says that isn’t normal, sir."
The Captain looked at the man for a moment and finally shrugged. "So, what does he make of it?"
"Sir, he says it sounds to him like something’s jammed and the servo keeps trying to do something it can't do."
Carruthers waited for more but there wasn't anything else coming. Finally, he said, "What kind of servos are there on a minisub, Mr. Gentry? Does he know that?"
The sailor held up one finger and said something into his commset. "Sir, he says they’re mostly for moving things, like manipulator arms, aiming cameras, stuff like that. Oh, and for diving planes and directional thrusters. That’s mostly it. Sir."
"Diving planes?" the Executive Officer murmured from just behind the Captain. Carruthers turned his head enough to quietly say, "Jammed? Down-angle?".
"Could be," his Exec mused. The Captain considered.
"How many turns on his screws, Mr. Gentry?" he finally asked.
After a pause and a quiet conversation, Gentry replied, "Far as they can tell, Sir, it being a minisub and all, she's running flat-out."
Captain Carruthers turned to his Second. "Why not just cut the drive and use positive buoyancy to surface?"
"Who knows? Maybe there's more than one problem. If there is a problem."
"Can we increase magnification some more and add a depth scale to it?"
"Yes, Sir, we can do that."
Jerry Carruthers smiled. He’d yet to ask for anything that his technicians couldn’t do almost immediately, no matter how off-the-wall the request was. He suspected they enjoyed the challenge. "Please do," he said.
Twenty seconds and it was there.
"Okay. The target...sub, whatever...started out at about three hundred feet, right?" He didn’t wait for an answer. It was there on the screen for anybody to read. He was simply thinking out loud, something they’d all gotten used to. "He made a beeline straight away from the...whatever we call that almost-an-island...that guyot..., for right at a third of a mile, dead-level. Then, all of a sudden, he decides to go deep. But there’s nowhere to go, right? We're in twelve thousand feet of water. He can't go that deep. Can he?" He looked around but no one answered. "What’s crush depth on one of those tin cans? A thousand? Five thousand?"
From somewhere on the other side of the CIC a voice came back, "We've got DSRV’s that'll go to three thousand, sir. At least, that's what I read somewhere." There was scattered laughter. Every man on board knew to the foot how deep they could hope to be rescued from and what DSRV’s were capable of.
"I doubt if what we’re looking at is a deep submergence-type rescue vehicle," he smiled. "So, what’s it’s probable crush depth? Anybody know for sure?"
"Most likely fifteen hundred feet, sir, or pretty close to it," came another voice from somewhere in the dimly-lit room.
"Thank you for a definitive answer, whoever you are," Carruthers chuckled. "Okay. Fifteen hundred. What's he down to now?" All eyes quickly searched the numbered grid on the screen. "Approaching six hundred feet, then," the Captain volunteered for the benefit of those whose view was blocked. "If he’s trying to escape, somebody should tell him he's going the wrong way." This time the laughter was contagious.
He looked around the room. Sure enough, deep in the recesses, he spotted her. He turned back and nonchalantly asked, "Has anyone seen Ms. Darlington?"
"Yes, Sir, I think she's in the immediate vicinity," came a voice from her vicinity. The voice was either warning the Captain in case he was about to say something derogatory, or going along with the charade. Either way, the Captain was covered.
"I would appreciate it if someone would ask her and her assistant if they would care to join me?" His voice was reasoned and pleasant.
A sailor, back in the gloom, officiously stepped in front of Jackie Darlington and politely asked her the question he knew she’d just heard herself. He was careful not to smile.
Her own smile appeared to be painfully executed, but she nevertheless replied that she would, in fact, like to join the Captain. The sailor invited her to follow him and escorted her the fifteen feet to where the Captain stood, his back to the melodrama.
/>
"Sir, Ms. Darlington and her assistant, as you requested."
"Ah, Ms. Darlington. Mister...?"
"Jerry. Just Jerry. Sir."
"Very well." His eyes slid back to the reporter's. "It occurred to me that this little drama might be of interest to you and your audience. Would you like for your camera...for 'Jerry'...to film it for use later? With the understanding, of course, that it's to be released only on my personal authority."
"Yes. I'd like that very much. Thank you. Jerry?"
The Captain motioned to his Second. "This officer will assist you in understanding what you may and may not point your camera at, for reasons of defense secrets. Is that acceptable?" Jerry nodded vigorously and attempted a weak smile for the man who had just recently brought him to the brink of death.
Captain Jerry Carruthers turned back and watched the monitor as, every few seconds, another ribbon appeared behind the red dot. He wondered, though not seriously, whether the red dot really was a small submarine. He wondered if someone were trying to escape the violence that must be raging inside that undersea mountain right now, with the TRAP team loose inside it. He wondered whether the person, or people, in the sub were good guys or bad guys. He wished he had radio contact with somebody who could tell him what was going on. But, most of all, he felt compassion for whoever was in the little submarine, good or bad, because unless it changed course pretty soon, somebody was going to die. And, he knew from experience, the waiting to die the inevitable death of crushing in the black depths was far worse than the event itself. At least, when it did happen, it would be over quickly.
Chapter 96
The battle for New Victoria hadn't gone well. The small group of hostages had retreated to the penthouse side of the cavern when it was vacated by the guards, who had finally gathered enough spine to counterattack the TRAP team. They were grateful that the guards' attention was diverted from themselves. But their situation was anything but good. The bullets that were flying didn't recognize their hostage status and Bill Layton had been shot through the hand when he had crossed an open area too slowly. He'd stubbornly patched it up himself with a strip from his tee-shirt and ordered everybody to ignore it. They were huddled now in the short hallway from which Janese Cramerton had been kidnapped a short time ago. But, of course, they didn't know that, any more than they knew how or why she'd disappeared.
